THE ESCAPE.
Thady left the house immediately after the last cruel speech his
father made to him, with the tears running fast down his face. He
leapt down the steps, hurried across the lawn, through the little
shrubbery, and over the wall into the road. He did not dare to go
alone down the avenue, and by the spot where Ussher's body had lain,
and where the ground would still be moist with his blood.
His father's words still rang dreadfully in his ears--"Murdered! of
course they'll call it murder! of course they'll be sure to hang
you!" And then he thought of all the bearings of the case, and it
seemed to him that his father must be right; that there could be
no doubt but that all men would call it by that horrid name which
sounded so hideously in his ears. If that which he had done was not
murder, what manner in which one man could kill another would be
thought so? It was now evident to him that Feemy had been with Ussher
willingly--that she was there of her own consent and by appointment;
and merely because she had fainted in his arms, he had struck him
down and killed him. Of course his father was right; of course they
would call it murder. And then again, even if he could justify the
deed to himself--even if he could make himself believe that the man
was at the time using violence to his sister--how could he get that
proved? whereas proofs of her having consented to go off with him
would no doubt not be wanting. And then again, Thady remembered--and
as he did so the cold sweat stood upon his brow--how lately he had
sat in company where the murder of this very man whom now he had
killed had been coolly canvassed and decided on, and he had been one
of those who were to be banded together for its execution. Would all
this be forgotten at his trial? Would there not certainly be some one
to come forward at that horrid hour, and swear these things against
him--ay, and truly swear them? And then he fancied the precision
with which he knew each damning word he had lightly uttered would
be brought against him. Would not these things surely condemn him?
Would they not surely hang him? It would be useless for him, then, to
open his bosom and to declare to them how hateful--even during the
feverish hours of that detested evening--the idea of murder had been
to his soul. It would be useless for him to tell them that even then,
at that same time, he had cautioned Ussher to avoid the danger with
which he was threatened. It would be vain for him to declare how soon
and how entirely he had since repented of the folly of which he had
on that occasion been guilty. The stern faces by whom he would be
surrounded at his trial--when he should stand in that disgraceful
spot, with his head leaning on that bar so often pressed by
murderers, miscreants, and thieves--would receive his protestations
very differently from that benign friend who had previously comforted
him in his misery. They would neither listen to nor believe his
assurances; and he said involuntarily to himself--"Murder! of course
they'll call it murder! of course they'll hang me!"
The oftener he thought of this, the more he hurried, for he felt that
the police would be soon in search of him, and that at most he had
but that night to escape from them. As these ideas crossed his mind
he hastened along the lane leading to Drumleesh, sometimes running
and sometimes walking, till the perspiration stood upon his brow. If
it was murder that he had done--if the world should consider it as
murder--then he would most probably soon be in the same condition as
that criminal whose trial had so vividly occurred to his recollection
a few days ago. At that time the idea had only haunted him; he had
only then dreamt of the possibility of his situation being the same
as that man's, and the very horror he had then felt at the bare
thought had made him determined to avoid those who could even talk
of the crime which would lead to that situation. But now he had of
his own accord committed that crime; and how had he done it? In such
a manner that he could by no possibility escape detection. Then
again he tried to comfort himself by reflecting that it was not
murder--that his intention had not been to murder the man; but his
father's horrid words again rang through his ears, and he felt that
there was no hope for him but in flight.
The moon got up when he was about half-way to his destination, and
he left the road lest by chance there might be any one out at that
hour who would recognise him. He crept on by the hedges and ditches,
sometimes running along the bits of grass between the tillage and
fences--sometimes having almost to wade through the wet bottoms
which he crossed, often falling, in his hurry and in the imperfect
light of the cloudy moon, till at last, tired, hot, and covered with
dirt, pale with fear, and nearly overcome by the misery of his own
reflections, he reached Corney Dolan's cabin. It was now about eleven
o'clock; it had been past ten when he left Ballycloran, and in the
interval he had traversed above five Irish miles. There was no light
in the cabin, which was a solitary one, standing on the edge of a
bog. Now he was there he feared to knock, as he did not know what to
say to Corney when he should come to the door. Besides, he was aware
that his hands and coat were soiled with blood, and he was unwilling
that the inmates of the cabin should see him in that plight.
He had, however, no time to spare, and as it was necessary that he
should do something, after pausing a few minutes, he knocked at the
door. No one answered, and he had to knock two or three times before
he was asked in a woman's voice who he was, and what he wanted there
at that hour of the night. He stated that he wanted to see Corney
Dolan. The woman told him that Corney Dolan wasn't at home, and that
he couldn't see him. Thady knew that he lived alone with his mother,
an aged woman, nearly eighty years old, and that it was she who was
speaking to him now.
"Nonsense, mother," said he; "he's at home I know, and I must see
him. Don't you know me?"
"Faix, then, I don't--and I don't want," said the old hag. "At any
rate, Corney's not here; so you may jist go back agin, whoever you
call yerself."
"But where is he, then? Can you tell me where I'll find him?"
"I can't tell you thin. What should I know myself? So now you know as
much about it as I do."
"Well, then, get up and let me in. Don't you know me? I'm Corney's
landlord, Thady Macdermot. I'll wait here till he comes; so get up
and let me in."
There was a silence for some time; then he heard the old woman say to
some one else,
"The Lord be praised! It can't be him--it can't be Mr. Thady coming
here at this time of night. Don't stir I tell ye--don't stir, avick!"
"Oh! but it wor him, mother. Shure, don't I know his voice?" answered
the child that the old woman had spoken to.
"I tell you it is me," shouted Thady. "Open the door, will you! and
not keep me here all night!"
The child now got up and opened the door, and let him into the single
room which the cabin contained. There were still a few embers of turf
alight on the hearth, but not sufficient to have enabled Thady to see
anything had not the moon shone brightly in through the door. There
was but one bed in the place,--at the end of the cabin farthest from
the door, standing between the hearth and the wall, and in this the
old woman was lying. The child, about eight years, had jumped out of
bed, stark naked, and now in this condition was endeavouring with
a bit of stick to poke the hot embers together, so as to give out
a better heat and light. But Thady was in want of neither, and he
therefore desired the boy to get into bed, and upsetting with his
foot the little heap which the urchin had so industriously collected
together for his benefit, so as to extinguish the few flickering
flames which it afforded, he sat down to try and think what it would
now be best for him to do.
"Where's Corney, then," he said, "at this hour? Will he be long
before he's here?"
"Not a one of me rightly knows, yer honer; maybe it 'll not be long
afore he's here, and maybe it 'll not be afore the morning," said the
child.
"And, maybe, not then," added his grandmother. "There's no knowing
when he 'll be here; maybe not for days. I don't know what's come to
them at all now--being out night skirring through the counthry; it
can't come to no good, any ways."
"When Corney's at home, where does he sleep?" said Thady, looking
round the cabin for a second bed, but seeing none.
"He mostly takes a stretch then down there afore the fire; but
Corney's not over partickler where he sleeps. For the matter of that,
I b'lieve he sleeps most out in the bog at day time."
Thady now sat down on one of the two rude stools with which the place
was furnished, either to wait for Corney, or to make up his mind what
other steps he would take. He had closed and bolted the door, and was
just in the act of asking the old woman whether Joe Reynolds was at
present living on his bit of land, or if not, where he was, when he
heard footsteps coming up to the little path to the door, and the
woman, sitting up in bed, said,
"There's both on 'em thin; get up, Terry, and open the door."
One of the men outside rattled the latch quietly, to let the inmates
know who it was that desired admittance; and the naked boy again
jumped out of bed, and opening the door, ran back and jumped in
again.
Two men now entered, whom Thady, as they appeared in the moonlight
through the open door, at once recognised as Joe Reynolds and Corney
Dolan. He was seated close to the fire, and in the darkness and
obscurity of the cabin, they did not at first perceive him.
A few moments since he had been longing for these two men who now
stood before him, as the only persons on whom he could depend for
security and concealment, and now that they were there he almost
wished them back again, so difficult did he find it to tell them what
he had to say, and to beg of them the assistance he required.
"Who the divil are you?" said Corney; "who's this you've got here,
mother?--and what made you let him in here this time of night?"
"Shure it's the young masther, Corney, and he axing afther you; you
wouldn't have me keeping him out in the cowld, and he waiting there
to see you that ought to have been at home and asleep two hours
since."
"Faix, Mr. Thady, and is that yerself?" said Corney; "well, anyway
you're welcome here."
"I'm glad to see you here, Mr. Thady," said Joe; "didn't I tell you
you'd be coming? though it's a quare time you've chosen. Didn't I
tell you you'd be changing your mind?"
"But was yer honer wanting me, Mr. Thady," said Corney; "'deed but
this is a bad place for you to come to; sorrow a light for ye or the
laste thing in life; what for did you not get a light, you ould hag,
when the masther came in?"
"A light is it, Corney; and how was I to be getting a light, when
there's not been a sighth of a bit of candle in the place since last
winter, nor likely to be the way you're going on now."
"Whisht there now," said Joe; "we'll be doing very well without a
light; but why wasn't you down here earlier, Mr. Thady?--We two have
just come from mother Mulready's, an' by rights, as you've come round
agin, you should have been there with us."
"Never mind that, Joe, but come out; I want to spake to you."
"Did you hear the news about Ussher?" continued Joe without moving,
and in a whisper which the old woman could not hear. "That blackguard
Ussher has escaped out of the counthry afther all, without paying any
of us the debt that he owed us, for all the evils he's done. He went
away out of Mohill this night, an' he's not to be back agin; av I'd
known it afore he started I'd have stopped him in the road, an' by
G----d he should niver have got alive out of the barony."
"But did you hear he was gone?" said Corney.
"I did," replied Thady: "but Joe I want to spake to you, and there's
no time to spare; come here," and Joe followed him to the door. "Come
further; I don't want him to hear what I've to say to you;" and he
walked on some little way before he continued,--"you were wishing
just now that you had shed Ussher's blood?"
"Well--I wor; I suppose, Mr. Thady, you're not going to threaten me
with the magisthrate again. I wor wishing it--an' I do wish it; he
was the hardest man on the poor--an' the cruelest ruffian I iver
knew. Isn't there my brother, that niver even acted agin the laws in
the laste thing in life,--the quietest boy, as you know, Mr. Thady,
anywhere in the counthry, an' who knew no more about stilling than
the babe that's unborn; isn't he lying in gaol this night all along
of him? an' it an't only him; isn't there more? many more in the same
way, in gaol all through the counthry; an' who but him put 'em there?
I do wish he was for-a-nens't me this moment, an' that I might lave
him here as cowld a corpse as iver wor stretched upon the ground!"
"I tell you, Joe, av you had your wish--av you struck the blow, and
the man you so hate was dead beneath your feet, you'd give all you
had--you'd give your own life to see him agin, standing alive upon
the ground, and to feel for one moment that you'd not his blood to
answer for."
"By G----d! no, Mr. Thady; I'm not so wake; and as for answering for
his blood, by the blessed Virgin, but I'd think it war a good deed to
rid the counthry of such a tyrant."
"He'll niver act the tyrant again, Joe, for he is dead. I struck him
down with my stick in the avenue at Ballycloran, this night, and he
niver moved agin afther I hit him."
"The holy Virgin save us! But are you in arnest, Mr. Thady? D'ye
main to say he's dead--that you killed him?" And after walking on a
little, he said,--"By the holy Virgin, I'd sooner it had been myself;
for I could have borne the thoughts of having done it better than you
are like to do. An' what did you do with the body?"
"Brady took it into Carrick."
"And does Brady know it war you did it?"
"Yes, they all know it--father and all; what was the use of telling a
lie about? Feemy was with him when I struck him."
"And war she going off with him? Niver mind, Mr. Thady, niver mind;
it's a comfort to think you've saved your sisther from him, an' you
know what a ruffian he was. By all the powers of glory there's a
weight off my mind now I know he's not escaped from the counthry,
where he caused so much misery, and did so much ill. But I'd a deal
sooner it had been I that done it than yourself."
"I wish it war not done at all--I wish he were alive this day. What
will I do now, Joe?"
"Faix, that's the question; any way, this is not the place for you
any longer; they'd have you in Carrick Gaol before to-morrow night,
av you were not out of this, an' far out of this too."
"Where is it you have the stills, Joe? Av I were there, couldn't I
be safe, for a little time at laste, till I got some plan of getting
entirely out of the counthry? Or may be when they hear the case,
and how it all happened, they mightn't think it murder at all,--the
Coroner I main; and then I could go home agin, or at any rate go away
where I choose without hindrance; it's little I care where I was, so
long as it's not in prison."
"I'm afraid, Mr. Thady, there's no hopes for you in that way. The
magisthrates, with Jonas Brown at the head of them, will be a dail
too willing to make a bad case of it, the divil mend them, to let you
off; an' the only thing for you is, to keep out of their hands."
"Would they find me there, Joe, up in the mountains, where you have
the stills?"
"They might, and they mightn't; but if you war there, an' they did
find you, they'd be finding the stills too, an' the boys wouldn't
like that."
"Where shall I go then? I thought you'd be able to help me. In
heaven's name, what shall I do? the night's half over now; can't you
think of any place where I might be, for to-morrow at any rate? I
depended on you, Joe, and now you won't help me."
"There you're wrong. I'm thinking now, where is the best place for
you: and by G----d as long as I can stick to you, I will; both becase
you were always a kind masther to the poor, an' becase the man you
killed war him I hated worse than all the world besides; but it's no
asy thing to say where you'd be safest. D'you know Aughacashel, Mr.
Thady?"
"I niver was there, but I know that's the name of the big mountain
over Loch Allen, to the north of Cash."
"Well, that's where the stills are mostly at work now, an' that's
where I was to be myself, to-morrow evening; but now we must both be
there before the sun's up, for no one must see us on the road. But,
Mr. Thady, how'll I do about taking you there, when you wouldn't come
to Mulready's to take the oath, which all must do afore they'll be
allowed among the boys that is together, or as will be together there
to-morrow evening?"
Thady then promised him, that when he reached their destination, he
would take any or every oath that might be proposed to him; that he
would join their society in every respect, whatever might be its
laws, and that if they would assist him in his present condition by
affording him whatever security might be in their power, he would
faithfully conform to all their rules and regulations. So far did
his fears and the agitated state of his mind overcome the great
repugnance which still he felt to break the solemn promise he had
given Father John, and which he had so faithfully intended to keep.
Reynolds reflected that though it was contrary to their regulations
to bring a stranger to the haunts where his companions carried on
their illegal trade, they could hardly be unwilling to give shelter
to the man who had killed the enemy whom they all so cordially hated,
and to murder whom they were all sworn; particularly when his present
necessity of concealment arose from the fact of his having done so.
Reynolds had an idea of justice in his composition: he knew that had
he murdered Ussher, his companions would have used every effort to
conceal him, and to baffle his pursuers; and he was determined that
they should do as much for Thady.
He went back to the cabin for Corney Dolan, and told him the story
which he had just heard; and at about midnight the party started for
the mountains.
Aughacashel is a mountain on the eastern side of Loch Allen, near the
borders of the County Cavan--uncultivated and rocky at the top, but
nevertheless inhabited, and studded with many miserably poor cabins,
till within about a quarter of a mile of the summit. The owners of
these cabins, with great labour, have contrived to obtain wretchedly
poor crops of potatoes from the barren soil immediately round
their cabins. To their agricultural pursuits many joined the more
profitable but hazardous business of making potheen, and they were
generally speaking, a lawless, reckless set of people--paying, some
little, and others no rent, and living without the common blessings
or restraints of civilization: no road, or sign of a road, came
within some miles of them; Drumshambo, the nearest village, was seven
or eight miles distant from them; and although they knew that neither
the barrenness of their locality, nor the want of means of approach
would altogether secure them from the unwelcome visits of the Revenue
police or the Constabulary, still they felt sure that neither of
these inimical forces could come into their immediate neighbourhood,
without their making themselves aware of their approach, in time to
guard against any injury which they might do them, either by removing
all vestiges of their trade, or by sending those who were in fear of
being taken up, into the more inaccessible portions of the mountain.
On the western side of Aughacashel, immediately over Loch Allen, and
about half way between the lowlands and the summit, a kind of rude
limekiln had been made, apparently for the purpose of burning lime
for the neighbouring land; but the very poor state of the rocky
ground about, which gave signs of but little industry, afforded
evidence that the limekiln had not added much to the agricultural
wealth of the country. It was now at any rate made use of for other
purposes, for it was in here that Joe Reynolds at present usually
worked his still. There were only two cabins immediately close to it;
one of which was occupied by a very old man and his daughter, but in
which Corney Dolan and Reynolds resided, when they were away from
Drumleesh; and the other belonged to another partner in the business,
who considered himself the owner of the limekiln, and the head of the
party concerned in it. This man's name was Daniel Kennedy, and to the
reckless, desperate contempt of authority and hatred of those who
exercised it, which characterized Reynolds, he added a cruelty of
disposition, and a love of wickedness, from which the other was much
more free.
This was the place to which his two guides were now conducting Thady,
and where it was proposed that he should, at any rate for some time,
conceal himself from those, who, it was presumed, would soon be
scouring the country in search of him. It was now a bright moonlight
night, and the three men hurried across the country with all the
haste they could make. Little was said between them as they went,
excepting observations made between Joe and his comrade, as to the
characters and occupations of the residents in the various cabins
by which they passed. After going for some considerable way across
fields and bogs and bottom lands, they came out on a lane, running
close round a small lake lying in the bed of the low hills which rose
on the other side of it. The water was beautifully calm, and the moon
shining immediately down upon it, gave it the appearance of a large
surface of polished silver. At this spot the fields came close down
to the road, and also to the water, and in the corner thus formed
stood a very small poor cabin.
This lake was Loch Sheen, and it was in that cabin that Ussher had
apprehended Tim Reynolds and the two other men, little more than a
fortnight ago.
Joe stopped a moment when he reached the spot, till Thady, who was
following the other man, had come up, and then, pointing to the low
door, close to which he stood, said,
"The last deed as that ruffian did as now lies so low was in that
cabin. It war there he sazed Tim, an' dragged him off with ropes
round his arms, an' sent him to Ballinamore Bridewell, an' all for
'spaking a few words of comfort to an owld woman he'd known since he
war a little child. I swore, Mr. Thady, that that man should be put
beneath the sod before the time came round that Tim should be out
agin; an' this very night I war a grieving in my heart to think that
he war out of the country safe an' merry--ready agin to play the same
bloody game with them among he war going; an' that I should let him
go without so much as making one effort to keep my word with him!
By G----d, Mr. Thady, quare as you may think it, who are now so low
within yerself with what you've done, that thought was heavy on my
heart this night. Had I known what way he war to travel, I'd followed
him, had it been for days an' nights, till I had got one fair blow.
By dad, he would niver have wanted a second. Corney what's the owld
hag doing since her two sons is in gaol along with Tim?"
"Ah! thin, she's doing badly enough; she war niver from her bed
since. Faix, Joe, they'll niver be out in time to bury her."
"Is it starving she is?"
"Well thin, I b'lieve that's the worst of it; that an' the agny, an'
no one to mind her at all, is enough to kill an owld woman like her."
"Niver mind," replied Joe, "it will be a comfort to her any way
to hear that Ussher's gone before her; not but what they'll go
to different places, though." And then, after a time, he added,
"Ussher's black soul has gone its long journey this night with more
curses on it than there are stones on these shingles. But come on,
lads, we mustn't be standing here; we must be in Aughacashel before
sunrise, or else they'll be stopping us as we pass through the
counthry."
And again they went through the clear bright moonlight. They passed
Loch Sheen, and soon afterwards another little lake, lying also to
the left of the road, and then they found themselves in the small
village of Cashcarrigan. This they passed through silently and
quickly and without speaking a word, and having proceeded about half
a mile on the road towards Ballinamore, they again left it and took
to the fields. They went along the northern margin of Loch Dieney,
running where the ground was hard enough, at other times stepping
from one dry sod to another, through gaps and fences, which seemed as
well known to Thady's guides as the cabins in which they had passed
their lives. They left Drumshambo to their left, and at about four in
the morning they came to Loch Allen. Here they got upon a road which
for some way skirts the eastern side of the lake, along which they
ran for about a mile and a half, and then turned into a small boreen
or path, and began to ascend the mountains.
"Asy boys, now," said Corney; "we're all right when we're here; an',
by the powers! I'm hot," and the man began wiping his brow with his
sleeve.
"What, Corney, you're not blown yet!" said the other, "an' here's Mr.
Thady as fresh as a four year old. Come along, man; the sooner he's
got a snug room over his head the better he'll be. You forget he's
not accustomed to be out all night, and take his supper of moonshine,
as you are. Come along, Mr. Thady; you'll soon be where you'll get as
good a dhrop as iver man tasted, an' you'll feel a deal better when
you've got a glass or two of that stuff in you."
Thady, who, in spite of Joe's compliment as to his freshness, was so
weary that he could hardly drag his legs along, and who had seated
himself for a moment upon one of the big loose stones which were
scattered over the side of the hill, again rose, and they all resumed
their journey. They soon lost the track of the boreen, but they still
continued to ascend, keeping by the sides of the loose built walls
with which the land was subdivided. It was astonishing what labour
had seemingly been wasted in piling wall after wall in that barren
place, and that even in spots where no attempt had been made at
tillage, and where the only produce the land afforded was the food of
a few miserable sheep and goats, which it might be thought could have
grazed in safety without the necessity for all those numerous fences.
These, however, after a time, ceased too; but just at the spot where
the open mountain no longer showed any signs of man's handiwork, Dan
Kennedy's lime-kiln was built, and immediately behind it were the two
cabins of which we have before spoken.
It was at the door of the furthest of these two that Joe--did not
knock--but raised the latch and rattled it. The old man within well
knew the sign, and, getting out of bed, drew the wooden bolt, and
admitted the three into the cabin. Though he did not expect Joe or
Corney, and had not an idea who Thady was; and though Thady's dress,
which was somewhat better than those worn by his usual associates,
must have struck him as uncommon, he made no remark, but hobbled into
bed again, merely saying, in Irish, "God save ye kindly, boys! it's
a fine night ye've had, the Lord be praised!" There was a second bed
in the place--if a filthy, ragged cotton tick filled with straw, and
lying on the ground, could be called a bed--in which the old man's
daughter was lying. It was nearly dark now out of doors, for the
moon had disappeared, and it was hardly yet six o'clock; but one of
the men lighted a candle, of which there were two or three hanging
against the wall. The girl was not asleep, for her eyes were wide
open, looking at the party, but she seemed not at all surprised by
their entrance, or at the addition to their usual numbers, for she
lay quite quiet where she was, as if such morning guests in her
bed-chamber were no unusual thing.
Joe now got a stool for Thady; and he and Corney sat down opposite
the fire, while Reynolds drew a stone jar out from beneath the old
man's bed--he seemed well to know the place where it was to be
found--and reaching a cracked cup down from a shelf which was fixed
into the wall over the fire-place, filled it with spirits and handed
it to Thady. He swallowed a considerable portion of it and returned
it, when Joe filled it again, finished the contents himself, and gave
it again full to Corney, who in a very short time did the same.
"By gor," said the latter, "I wanted that; an' I tell you that's not
bad work. Why, Mr. Thady--"
"Have done with your Misthers, Corney," said Joe, in a whisper, "let
them find out who he is theyselves. They'll know soon enough, divil
doubt them! there's no good telling them yet, any how."
"That's thrue, Joe; but as I was saying, that's not bad work; why,
Mr. Thady--"
"Sorrow saze yer tongue, thin, ye born idiot!"
"Well, by dad, it comes so natural to me, Joe, to call him by his
own name, that one can't help it; but it war only four o'clock
when we left this, this blessed afthernoon--that is, yesterday
afthernoon--an' since that we wor down at Mulready's, an' then at
Drumleesh, an' now we're here agin; why how many miles is that?"
"Niver mind the miles; he"--and Joe pointed to Thady--"he has done a
deal more than that in the same time--an' whatever comes of it, he
did a good deed. Howsomever, if you'll take my advice, you'll take a
stretch now. Meg!--I say, Meg,"--and he turned round to the girl who
was lying in the corner--"get out of that, an' make room for this man
to lie down. You've been asleep all night; make room for yer betthers
now."
The girl, without grumbling, turned out of bed, and burthened with no
feeling of conventional modesty, commenced and finished her toilet,
by getting into an old ragged calico gown, and tying up, with a bit
of antique tape, her long rough locks which had escaped from their
bondage during her sleep. Thady for a long time resisted, but Joe at
last was successful in persuading him to take advantage of the bed
which Meg had so good-humouredly relinquished.
"I an' Corney have still-work to do afore daylight, an' we won't be
back afore it's night," said Joe, "but do you bide here, an' you'll
be safe. You must put up with the pratees this day, for there's
nothing better in it at all; but I'll be getting something fitter for
you by night; an' av' you feel low, which you'll be doing when you
wakes, mind, there's the sperrits in the jar there undher the bed; a
sup of it won't hurt you now an' agin, for indeed you'll be wanting
it, by yerself here all day. An' look you,"--and he led him to the
door as he spoke, and pointed to the two within--"they'll soon know
who you are, an' all about it; but you needn't be talking to them,
you know; an' you may be quite certain, that even should any one
be axing about you, they'll niver 'peach, or give the word to the
police, or any one else. Av you like to go out of this during the
day, don't go further than the kiln; an' av you lie there, you could
easily see them miles afore they war nigh you, even av anything
should put it into their heads to think of coming afther you to
Aughacashel."
The two guides then took their leave of him, and Thady laid himself
down on Meg's bed, and, after a time, from sheer fatigue and
exhaustion, he fell asleep.